Washington Football Team should regret releasing Richard Rodgers

Releasing Richard Rodgers a few months ago was a mistake for the Washington Football Team.

I know, I know, I’m being nitpicky. Although the Washington Football Team didn’t make any splashy moves this past offseason, they did find some nice, young pieces. As our own Jacob Troutman noted in his piece on Kyle Smith, the additions of Kendall Fuller, Logan Thomas, Ronald Darby, and Kyle Allen are among the building blocks for the team’s growth this season.

When the team did roster cutdowns, many fans were upset that the team let go of Adrian Peterson, which at the time, seemed like a poor decision. However, after seeing the strides that Antonio Gibson has made in this offense, it looks to have been the right decision.

One of the cuts that didn’t get much attention at the time was the release of Richard Rodgers. And why would it? Rodgers only had one catch for seven yards over his previous two seasons with the Philadelphia Eagles. He was far removed from his best season with the Packers in 2015 when he had 58 receptions for 510 yards and eight touchdowns.

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That was the same year when the Rodgers (Aaron and Richard) connected on, what has been dubbed, The Miracle in Motown, a 61-yard game-winning Hail Mary that changed the trajectory of the Packers season. Rodgers had one of the best games of his career, with 8 catches for 146 yards to go along with the game-winning touchdown.

However, it looks as if Rodgers’ career started to dwindle after 2015. In 2015, he played on 70 percent of the Packers’ offensive snaps, and that number steadily trickled down in each consecutive season, until 2019, when Rodgers played in 0 percent of offensive snaps with the Eagles while battling injuries.

If you look deeper into the stats though, you realize that in 2016 and 2017, the Packers had a three-headed WR attack with Jordy Nelson, Davante Adams, and Randall Cobb. With the Eagles, Rodgers played behind Zach Ertz and Dallas Goedert at TE, so his lack of snaps is not too surprising.

The fact that Washington decided to keep Marcus Baugh and Jeremy Sprinkle over Rodgers is a bit surprising. Now, Rodgers isn’t known for his blocking but both Baugh and Sprinkle are predominantly blocking tight ends that haven’t really proved much in the receiving game.

In fact, outside of Logan Thomas, the three tights ends that have seen playing time for Washington this season (Sprinkle, Baugh, and Temarrick Hemingway), have combined for only three receptions for 18 yards.

That. Is. Pathetic.

Don’t get me wrong, Rodgers isn’t amazing, but with Alex Smith’s propensity to check down the ball, it would have been beneficial to have another serviceable TE opposite Logan Thomas.

Rodgers’ stat line for the year is fairly similar to Thomas’s, despite playing on 35% of offensive snaps, compared to 89%. Just have a look for yourself:

• Thomas: 11 games, 34 catches, 328 yards, four TDs
• Rodgers: 11 games, 24 catches, 345 yards, two TDs

Rodgers is currently the second leading receiver for the Eagles behind Travis Fulgham and has stepped up for the team as Ertz and Goedert have dealt with injuries throughout the year.

He also has a 77.4 percent catch percentage, which is one of the best on the Eagles and is more than 20 percentage points better than that of Logan Thomas. He also has 0 drops and gets a first down on 66 percent of his receptions, both numbers besting Thomas as well.

Another major indicator of value is the fact that passers have a 134.5 rating when targeting Rodgers this season, compared to 80.4 when targeting Thomas. If you look at Wentz’s average passer rating of 73.4 for the season, it shows how much better his overall rating is when targeting Rodgers.

And it doesn’t hurt that he can come down with grabs like this:

https://twitter.com/thecheckdown/status/1333628838358650881?s=20

Throughout the season, Richard Rodgers, as well as Logan Thomas, have far outperformed their APY, while Washington’s back-up TE, Jeremy Sprinkle, has played at a level below his APV.

Although it might not seem like keeping Rodgers would have had a major impact, it would have been another win for Rivera’s low-cost, high-value approach the team has been leveraging this season.